Ink and Murder
by writable
Summary: The word rings through his ears unpleasantly. Dead. Such sharp edges it has. It is a spike in a canvas of curves, a weed in a meadow of flowers. Christian feels his heart begin to retreat in his chest. Perhaps this was a bad thing to do. Oneshot.


**Yet another ficlet for you all! I really enjoy writing these, they're rather fun to crank out. The context for this one is pretty straightforward, set at the end of the movie. **

The end.

There it is, in all its finite glory. Two simple words that promise to end all his pain and misery. The end. The end of tears, the end of reliving a splendidly horrific time in his life.

Just the end.

But Christian doesn't feel ended. He doesn't feel any of those things. He doesn't feel even a merciful morsel of relief, and his tear stained cheeks still glisten in the moonlight. There has been no salvation for his aching heart, no peace for his overworked mind.

But it says, "The End".

Christian leans back in his chair, and breathes, drowning himself in air pregnant with undercurrents of fear and hopelessness. He presses his eyes tightly shut, not caring if they'll ever open again. He thinks about the words that come just before the end of his story. The lesson about love. There is truth in that it is the greatest lesson one can ever learn. But it doesn't mean it's painless.

His fists clench.

How unfair it is that he cannot just die. A sturdy knife and enough nerve to drive it in would surely stop all his troubles. Living this way, unshaven, unkempt, tortured- is cruelty. What has he ever done in his life that justifies the searing pain he feels within his chest every breathing moment? He wants it to end, he wants it all to end, just like his story promised him it would. But it can't. The Moulin Rouge has made him a coward. And now there's no going back. Or forward.

Images of Satine dance through his head like gypsies around a campfire. They are haunting and intoxicating, and Christian tries desperately to keep them in his memory for as long as he can. But they are fleeting, and her pale as moon flesh slips from his mind's fingers long before he is ready to let go. His lips pull back from hers with affection left to spare. Her laughter turns into silence too quickly. She is gone, and the thought of being alone with himself is too much to stand.

He stands abruptly, brushing off his clothes with an absent-minded hand. The room is closing in on him, he can feel it. He has to get away. Memories seem to float back, dancing across the walls like the shadow of a flame. They mock him, so present, so impalpable. Can a shadow be touched? Christian doesn't stay to find out.

The sting of winter is like fire to his skin, and he grins at the harshness of the weather. So unforgiving, so straightforward. He cherishes it. Few moments have come where he hasn't felt like some sort of delicate flower, fragile, perhaps due to loneliness and maybe just a touch of insanity. But the weather is indiscriminate. It knows no age, no emotion, no mind. It only knows how to chill to the bone.

Christian realizes that the refreshing thing about the weather is not the welcomed torrent of wind against his burning cheeks. It's the ability to make him feel, really _feel. _He feels the snow against his unprepared hands, the delectable battle of warmed blood against raw ice. He feels his nose go numb, sees the cloud of breath stagnate in the air before him. Never before has he felt his pulse quite so prevalently in the crook of his neck, in the plateau of his wrist.

He feels so alive.

And it kills him to know this, because the one thing that he needs to survive is dead.

The word rings through his ears unpleasantly. Dead. Such sharp edges it has, so unable it is to conform to its surroundings. It is a spike in a canvas of curves, a weed in a meadow of flowers. Christian feels his heart begin to retreat in his chest. Perhaps this was a bad thing to do.

He takes a look at the city around him. The snow is white, but it does not censor the impurity of Christian's thoughts. Winter is the season of a death of sorts, of hibernation and change, and he feels the familiar tug of wanting to achieve that end. The blurry blackness would be warmly welcomed by him. His story promised him an end.

Is it too much to want it now?

A cool breeze presses itself upon his face, and he feels as if he has just been electrocuted. Why does the world torture him this way, dragging him into pools of indifference and then appreciation? Perhaps if it made up its mind, he could make up his, at last finding some salvation in some sort of ending. But instead, it seems dead-set on leaving him in a cruel limbo, unable to move forward, unable to escape the past.

Suddenly, Christian knows the answer.

It dawns on him in an instant that the world has not made him its prisoner. Words have, _his _words. 'The end' bounces through his head the way a bullet would if fired into a proofed room. It is his own fault he feels this way. He has damned himself to an eternity of wishing for something that the universe has not deemed him ready for.

His feet carry him back to his apartment faster than he can realize it, and he hastily opens the door, making his way to the very stack of paper that seems to have an unsettling sort of control over his life. He flips it over carefully, pulling the very last sheet off and placing it solidly onto the desk. He spots the curse that he has put over himself at the bottom of the page. Lunging for his pen, Christian uncaps it with quivering hands, and draws a firm line through his story's parting words.

It is winter, the season of death, and Christian has finally done some killing. There is no blood save for the traces of fresh ink on his parchment, no evidence of the murder he has committed. Cleanly and expertly he has laid death itself to rest, for his time has not yet come.


End file.
